


Scars We Hide

by SoulStealer1987



Series: Starchasers [3]
Category: Warframe
Genre: F/F, aka what happens when a tenno fresh out of tsd uncovers cephalon fragments, also gay, and both tenno and cephalon proceed to have mental breakdowns
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-21
Updated: 2019-05-04
Packaged: 2020-01-23 02:29:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 14
Words: 9,696
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18540457
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SoulStealer1987/pseuds/SoulStealer1987
Summary: Spoilers for The Second Dream, Cephalon Fragments. The Uranus quest is hinted at.Storm doesn't know her own name. She doesn't know what's going on anymore, doesn't know why she ever thought she did. And shedefinitelydoesn't know why there's strange transmissions from her cephalon hidden in his fragmented data banks, transmissions he seems to have no memory of and can't seem to hear, either.





	1. Chapter 1

Storm wants to get up. Which is—ridiculous, honestly. She’s Tenno, one of the fierce, brave warriors of gun and blade, capable of feats no ordinary warrior could hope to accomplish.

Except, that’s in a frame. And, as she knows now—she’s _not_ her Warframe, any of her Warframes. She’s not Mag, the frame she woke up with the first time and the second. She’s not Valkyr, or Zephyr, or Mirage. She’s _definitely_ not Chroma, frequently as she uses him. And she’s not Nova, as fun as she is to run around as.

She’s… herself. Whoever _herself_ is. She’s been using Storm for a while, but that’s… not _her_. Storm was, and is, the Tenno. And she’s… she should have a name. Everyone has a name.

Everyone, except her, and her fellow Tenno.

Lotus said that because the Reservoir was unsafe now, she would attempt to extract as many as the other Tenno as she could. She remembers some others, other Tenno that still remain today.

Libra. Hermes. Flash. So many more. All of them Tenno. None of them know who they are, and Storm certainly doesn’t remember them from before. She doesn’t even quite remember a before. Not clearly, anyway.

But she’s… someone, apparently. A girl, not quite an adult but not quite a child. A girl with red hair that keeps getting in her eyes, and skin that she _really_ doesn’t think should be this pale, that’s probably a problem.

And if she’s someone, she should be able to stand on her own. Move on her own. So she tries. Pushes down with her arms and her hands and her legs and—everything she is.

And it isn’t enough. She just doesn’t have the strength to stand. To be. Her head dips in shame, her gaze finding the floor of the chamber she only just learned existed. It still bears the scars of the Stalker’s assault, and Hunhow, and—hell, it was such a blur of memories that she remembers it about as well as she does anything before waking up. Which is to say, not well. Not well at _all._

“Operator?” Ordis asks, concern lacing his words. She’s not wearing a helmet, but she must have some kind of ocular implant somewhere because his cool blue symbol appears on the right side of her vision. “Are you alright?”

Her throat’s dry. Storm licks her lips, finds her own words.

“Yeah,” she lies. “Just _peachy._ Why?”

“You have been outside of Transference for nearly twenty minutes. Also…”

Storm raises an eyebrow.

“Also,” Ordis adds, “you are _not_ a very good liar, Operator.”

“Damn.”

“Operator!”

The other eyebrow goes up. “Ordis, are you _actually_ going to call me out on swearing when you do it regularly? I’m not a child.”

 _Although,_ she adds silently, _I almost wish I still was._

“Of course not, Operator. What do you need?”

Storm sighs. “I—I need to stand.”

“Operator?”

“I need to stand. I want to stand. I can do so much with a Warframe, but without one I’m helpless. The Stalker proved that much. He—I felt it, Ordis, I felt him thrust his sword into Mag and then he tried to kill me and I—I can’t be that helpless on my own. I just—I just can’t.”

The words are just coming spilling out, and something’s dripping down her face now, spilling out from her eyes and she’s pretty sure it’s called crying and it’s—she just—

“Listen to me!”

Ordis’ voice sounds deeper than usual, for some reason—although maybe she’s imagined it because when he next speaks, he sounds normal.

“Operator. You are _not_ helpless. You have been asleep since the Old War at _least_ , and while Ordis can’t tell you how long ago that was, it has clearly been a _very long time._ ”

She tries to lift an arm to wipe her eyes, finds she can’t even manage that. Instead she fires off, more than a little sarcastically, “Well yeah, I knew that—”

“When you’re asleep for a long time, you don’t move. When you don’t move, you don’t use any of your muscles. When you don’t use them, _they atrophy from disuse and you can’t move anymore._ ” His voice’s definitely gone deeper that time, but it’s back to normal when he makes a sound like clearing his throat, if he had one. “You need to use your body again, Operator. Your real one. Assuming you don’t want to spend forever in the somatic link.”

Storm laughs humorlessly. “What do you think, Ordis?”

“Start small, and be careful. _Don’t_ stretch too much at one time, or too far. Stretch until it hurts just a little, but no farther. I—Ordis will do what he can to help. Which isn’t as much as he would like.”

Even though she still wants to cry, Storm smiles. “It’s alright. Just… tell me what I need to do. You probably know better than me.”

“Ordis is a _Cephalon,_ ” he mutters, and she gets the distinct sense that if he had a physical body, he’d be shaking his head with a tired smile. “But Ordis will do his best.”


	2. Chapter 2

It’s a few cycles before she can stand, quite a few more before she can walk. And even then, it’s with help. Either by leaning on the sides of the ship or on one of her frames. Chroma, usually—he _is_ the bulkiest. And very huggable, although unfortunately it’s kind of impossible for her to hug the one she could really use a hug from, if she’s being honest.

Lotus isn’t around much—through unspoken agreement between Operator and Cephalon, they’ve agreed that it’s probably for the best she doesn’t know about this. Neither are quite sure why, but Ordis has proven to be quite good at making up excuses so Storm can get back to the somatic link and act like she hasn’t moved, at all.

So, actually, the Lotus does check in, over comms, at least once a cycle. Not for long, maybe a deci-cycle if that. And it’s… awkward, to say the least, because somehow Storm gets the feeling that Lotus knows a _lot_ more than she’s telling her.

So by the time Storm’s made it to standing, if with a lot of help, she’s started peppering Lotus with questions. Stuff like _who am I?_ and _who are you?_ and quite a few other things that she doesn’t get answers for.

Finally she resorts to asking, “Did you know me?”

That doesn’t get the usual lack of an answer. That gets confusion, visible confusion, and that’s an opening Storm can use.

“Did you know my name?” She asks, leaning forward in the somatic link, hope in her eyes.

“No.”

If she hadn’t been so disheartened by the response, she would have been thrilled to get her first straightforward answer since Lua.

“It’s… possible you will remember on your own, with time,” Lotus adds, quieter. “I did know your callsign, as I did all the Tenno.”

Storm raises an eyebrow. “What was it?”

“You already know, Storm.”

She swears her heart stops for a second, because—shit, she’d never given much thought to why she’d started going by Storm. It had just felt right, and Lotus had been all too happy to start calling her that instead of just _Tenno_.

“So how about the others?” She asks. “Did any of them remember their names?”

“Some have. Some have not. Some have refused to tell me. Regardless—your cephalon knows how to contact me if you need me.”

With that, she cuts the connection, and Storm leans back in the chair with a ragged sigh.

“How much trouble would I be in if I got you to send her the same message you sent Darvo when we met him?”

“It depends, Operator,” Ordis says, sounding more than a little amused. “If the Lotus’ mother is anything like her father, however, Ordis suspects she would not be as offended as— _that thieving, merchant scum_ —as Darvo was.”

“So can I get you to send it?”

“Absolutely not. She would not miss the sentiment behind it, and— _did your stomach just growl?”_

“Uh, is that what that is?” Storm frowns, glances down. “I am a… little hungry? I think. Not entirely sure what that feels like, but this might be it.”

“Coming out of cryosleep typically has residual effects, such as the very slow return of _inconsequential_ things such as hunger and thirst,” Ordis mutters, and judging by how annoyed he’d sounded, he was quoting something. “I’m marking the nearest Corpus ship on navigation. We’re getting you some nutrients, I just got you back, I am _not_ —Ordis is not going to let you die of something as _inconsequential_ as starvation.”

Storm’s stomach growls again, and she nods, obediently transfers back into her Chroma. If she’s carrying things, she’s going to want her biggest frame. Then she realizes something.

“Ordis,” she says, her voice surprisingly working through her frame despite its notable lack of a mouth, “we’re orbiting Earth, aren’t we?”

“Yes, Operator. Why?”

“Wouldn’t the Grineer be closer?”

 _"Operator_. Do you _really_ want to find out what the Grineer eat?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> She _really_ doesn't. I've yet to find a source for _what_ Grineer eat, besides their weird Grokudrul energy drink thing on the plains, but it's probably not exactly appetizing. Also, I get that it would make the game a lot more tedious if you had to, y'know, feed your Operator but c'mon. They're still kids, they're still growing, screwed with by the Void or not they kinda need food.


	3. Chapter 3

Storm still doesn’t know what the Grineer eat. And frankly, based on everything else involving them, she doesn’t want to. She doubts Ordis would tell her, anyway. Maybe Cressa would, although she’d doubtless be curious why a Tenno would want to know. Not that long ago, she would have been curious too.

Almost as if summoned by her thoughts, Ordis says, “Another transmission from Steel Meridian, Operator. I believe they are worried about you.”

“Speak of the devil,” she mutters, choosing to omit the second half of the phrase. She’s honestly not sure what that saying came from, but she wants to say it was something Margulis said fairly often.

_ Speak and the devil and they shall appear, _ Margulis had often said, but while the words themselves weren’t exactly friendly, Margulis was. Margulis was…

Well, dead, now. For one thing.

“Would you like me to send something back?”

Storm’s brow furrows in confusion. “What would you even send?”

Ordis hums to himself, says, “Just something assuring them you are not dead and not allying with their enemies. Just… dealing with personal matters.”

It takes Storm a second to get it, but when she does, she starts laughing. Just snickering to herself at first, but it slowly segues into full-on, laughing so hard her sides start to hurt.

“Good one, Ordis,” she manages to get out.

“...what do you mean, Operator?”

She stops. For a second, she just  _ stops _ , and then it hits her and she’s laughing even harder.

“You mean—you mean that was  _ unintentional? _ ”

“What was unintentional? Operator! Why are you laughing so hard, did you hit your head—”

“Ordis.  _ Ordis.” _ Storm takes a deep breath, and while she’s managed to stop laughing for now, she’s still grinning like the idiot she is.  _ “Personal _ matters.”

Ordis is silent for a while. Completely silent. As in, even the ship is more or less silent, aside from what’s completely necessary to keep it powered and in low-Earth orbit. Storm’s starting to get worried when his icon flickers back into being on the edge of her vision, and she’s not at  _ all _ sure how cephalons laugh but judging by the way the ship is  _ almost _ shaking, this is probably it.

_ “Was that a pun?” _

* * *

Storm’s curled up against the codex console, peering dubiously into a nutrient canister. She’d stolen a few from the Corpus, as many as her Chroma could carry while setting everything else in sight on fire, and gotten the blueprints to create more on her own from a data vault she’d promptly gotten wiped. That mission could have gone a lot better, honestly—but all things considered it could have gone a lot worse.

The first few had been decent. This is the first she’s crafted herself, though, and it looks… unappetizing, to say the least. There’s dark clumps, swirling around a darker mass of… something.

She could almost say she’d rather eat Infested tissue.  _ Almost. _

“Ordis,” she mutters, “what did the blueprint say this was called again?”

“A regular nutrient canister, Operator. Although they did have different flavors.”

“And this one is…?”

Ordis just sighs, leaving her to swirl around the contents of the canister more with the disposable, crafted-in utensil.

“The Corpus can’t name  _ shit _ ,” he mutters eventually.

“It’s named shit?”

“Worse.”

Clearly he isn’t about to tell her what it’s actually called, so she figures—might as well give it a try. Dubiously, she raises a bit to her mouth, slips it in, chews a little.

It goes right back in the container, and she chokes out,  _ “Fuck _ , that’s disgusting. Tastes like shit.”

“I believe you are meant to add the flavoring packet on the bottom. The ones you initially stole already had them added.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We'll get to the actual action next chapter I promise.


	4. Chapter 4

It tastes much less like shit with flavoring added, Storm’ll admit. And while frames don’t need to eat, she apparently does. Which—yeah, that makes sense. She would have thought the Lotus would have that part handled, though. Unless…

Well. On second thought, maybe it makes sense that she wouldn’t need to deal with basic human functions. But that begs the question, how does Ordis know if Lotus doesn’t? He’s not human, either.

Storm considers asking, ultimately decides against it. Instead she activates the codex console, starts flicking through things aimlessly. Maybe something’ll trigger her memory, enough that she can remember her name. Her  _ real _ name, not Storm. She likes going by Storm, it’s a cool name to go by, but it isn’t—well,  _ her. _

“My databanks are still regretfully incomplete, Operator,” Ordis says. “But you are welcome to look through them.”

“Thanks,” she replies, almost as an afterthought, and keeps scrolling.

Incomplete is putting it lightly. She’s got all the entries completed from Earth and, for some reason, Europa. Besides that, it goes down very, very fast. She’s got one complete on Venus, Mars, and Jupiter apiece, and mere fragments everywhere else. She’s got maybe one scan in the Derelict, if that.

She sighs, heads back to the first image, and zooms in some. It’s… pretty, almost, the overgrown jungle, and Storm reads the text below to herself. The atmosphere on Earth hadn’t seemed  _ that _ toxic to her, but admittedly she’s never been there in person and it’s been established that frames are… weird.

It’s then, right before she swipes to the next image, that she hears it. A… buzzing, almost. An odd sort of noise that’s almost the staticky buzz of poor transmission quality. Storm frowns, glances up.

“Ordis,” Storm says softly, “do you hear that?”

“Hear… what, Operator?”

She lifts her hand from the console experimentally, and it stops. She taps a finger to it again, moves it around some, and the static noise changes some, grows louder than softer again.

“Never mind.”

Ordis apparently can’t hear it. Which—well, this is his data she’s going through, he should be able to hear it but if he can’t… maybe there’s a reason for it?

Storm moves her finger around more, frowning, and—something clicks. The image appears the same, but a transmission plays through her earpiece—and she  _ freezes. _ She knows that voice.

“I have hidden the truth of my existence… from the Operator, from myself.”

That’s  _ Ordis. _ Why does Ordis have hidden messages inside his own files? For… himself? For her? For someone, something else entirely?

Storm bites her lip, keeps quiet, keeps listening.

“Take it from me, knowing is hell,” the transmission—Ordis, for sure, unmistakably so—continues. “Stop now. You will want to laugh. You will want to scream.”

The transmission fizzles out, and Storm just sits there, in her sleek black bodysuit, barefoot and with the last remnants of the ill-fated nutrient canister somewhere nearby. The ship feels… colder than usual. Or maybe that’s because she’s barefoot.

“Ordis?” She asks, quieter than before. “Did you hear  _ that? _ ”

“No, Operator, I did not. Do you need to sleep?”

Actually, yeah, she does. But for now she says, “Later.”

She should sleep, go on a mission, do some exercises or something so she can actually walk around without collapsing after five steps and making Ordis panic. She should do something,  _ anything _ except dig into this.

_ Stop now, _ Ordis had said, and she—she wants to listen. 

But the other part of her wants to find out, and the curious side wins out. She flicks to the next entry. This one’s covering kavats and other wildlife, and—yes, the buzzing’s still there. She tries the spot that had triggered the first transmission first.

Surprise, surprise, it doesn’t do anything and the staticky buzzing is even quieter. So she goes back to where she’d started, traces her finger along the image carefully, slowly, meticulously.

She finds the second transmission, listens to it with the same rapt attention as she’d given the first. 

Ordis can’t hear it this time either.


	5. Chapter 5

_“Hey, Storm,”_ Libra signs. _“Haven’t seen you around for a while.”_

She doesn’t know if Libra’s… well, awoken. Yet. And she’s not about to ask, because she’s probably not, and she doesn’t need to piss off Lotus. So instead her Nova’s hands move to sign back, _“Personal matters. Needed some alone time.”_

_“Yeah… look, you know I’m more in with the Veil than Steel Meridian. But they’re seriously worried about you. Which is saying something, considering the Veil didn’t care to contact me when I—”_

She, or rather her Valkyr, abruptly stops signing. _“Sorry. Said too much. Just drop my cephalon a transmission when you… yeah, never mind. You’ll know.”_

She knows, alright. And from the sound of things, Lotus told her the very same thing she told Storm. It’s with that in mind she says, with her own voice, “Ordis? I—don’t know if you can do this, but can you add Libra and I to the same voice channel?”

“Ordis can try, Operator. Give me just a moment.”

A moment passes, two—and Libra’s Valkyr visibly straightens up. Another goes by, and the crackle of comms.

“Storm?” Someone asks, and it’s—Void and stars, it’s Libra. Her voice is a bit deeper than Storm maybe expected, but it’s—it’s unmistakably _her._ “You’re—you’ve—”

“Yeah,” Storm says, and it’s then that somehow, video feed pops up too. Of Libra, anyway.

Libra looks very, very different than Storm does. She’s got glossy black-brown hair tied back that still frizzes up in a way that Storm’s definitely doesn’t, warm brown skin that almost— _almost_ —glows, and bright golden eyes that gleam with an almost feral light to them. She’s… uh. Really. Uh. Yeah.

“Wow, you’re cute,” Storm manages to squeak out.

Calling it squeaking is no exaggeration, she nearly loses control of transference for a few seconds and once she more or less regains her bearings, she’s dimly aware of Ordis _actually_ laughing. And also, thankfully, switching off the video feeds.

“Uh, thanks? You’re cute too,” Libra says awkwardly. “Anyway. I’m Amber. You?”

Her brain ceases to function again, this time for a much worse reason. “I… don’t know,” Storm says. “Yet. I’m trying to remember. It’s just… just Storm for now.”

Libra, Amber _,_ is quiet for a bit. Then she says, “Got it. So what are you doing here, anyway?”

“Right. Um.” Storm clears her throat anxiously. “I was looking for some of my cephalon’s data fragments, there’s supposed to be some around here somewhere. Should be bright blue.”

“Data _fragments?”_ Amber whistles appreciatively. “Hey, Chary—you have no idea how glad I am right now that you’re Corpus-made. But I gotcha, Storm. Let’s see if we can’t get your cephalon fixed up.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Anyway, Ordis is going to be teasing her about this for weeks, assuming nothing else happens... but _someone has a cru-ush~_
> 
>  
> 
> ~~Admittedly the gay isn't very prevalent here and honestly I wasn't planning on having this ship appear in this fic at _all_ but uh. Things didn't go according to plan lol anyway this is Libra, another of my void kids and there's like... quite a few lol~~


	6. Chapter 6

Between the two of them, they manage to get them all after more cycles than either would care to admit. Every single fragment, until Storm’s cephalon cheerfully says, “Ordis thinks that’s the last one, Operator! Why don’t you check the codex?”

“Hey, we did it,” Amber says. They haven’t met in _person_ , not yet, not outside their frames—but Storm thinks she can imagine the easy grin she’s got to be wearing. And how cute she looks. Yeah, she's going to have a mental breakdown on the spot when/if they meet in person and that's going to be all kinds of embarrassing. “Seeya, Storm. Let me know if you find anything interesting.”

“Will do,” Storm says, knowing full well she won’t. Not if it’s… the transmissions. Or maybe she will, if there’s a way to tell her without Ordis knowing.

She doesn’t know why she doesn’t want Ordis to know. The transmissions are from him, but—there’s got to be some reason why he can’t hear them. Maybe he’d blocked them out. Or maybe he can hear them and he’s just messing with her, but… she doesn’t think he is.

That’s why, as soon as her frame’s back in place and Amber's cut comms, Storm transfers out of Mag, back into herself, and stands. She’s not quite to running yet, not for long periods of time. But she can definitely jog, and she jogs past her still, unmoving frame at the arsenal, grabbing a nutrient canister on the way to the codex console.

And then she sits. And listens. And listens, and listens, and listens. The transmissions change before long, coming not from Ordis but someone… else. Someone different. Someone calling himself Ordan Karris, the Beast of Bones.

Storm doesn’t get it, not at first. After the first transmission from… Ordan, she finds herself wondering, _who is this guy and why is he in my cephalon’s files?_

And then, he says it.

“What did I expect, Operator?” Ordan murmurs, but Storm doesn’t hear the rest of what he says. She gets it to replay, painstakingly. Once. Then twice. She still doesn’t comprehend what he’s saying until the third or fourth time, because her mind’s still whirling.

Ordan’s voice is deeper, angrier than Ordis, but for that one word—Storm heard him in it. Ordan Karris _is_ Ordis, somehow.

_I began to think that a cephalon cannot be made. They are found, like pearls. Torn from muscle. Polished, and then set in chains._

Suddenly, Ordis’ musings at the beginning make sense. So much sense, a horrible kind of sense. But Storm doesn’t go back, she _can’t_ go back. She can only go forward.

And she does. She keeps listening, nearly chokes on the last dregs of her canister when things take a turn for the worse. Ordan, Ordis, whoever he is—he narrates on his own grim tale, the great last stand of a warrior. The last battle of the Beast of Bones.

Until everything goes _wrong_.

Storm keeps listening, now with horror as Ordan Karris dies, and Ordis is born from what’s left of him. Ordis, forced to forget, _forced_ to care. She’d—Void, she’d thought… wrong. On so many things.

“I watch tiny glittering fragments fall into the pit,” Ordis murmurs—not the Ordis of now, the Ordis of the transmissions. “I am happy again.” His voice even sounds lighter, happier—but is it really happiness if it’s all fake? If it’s all a lie?

Storm has to do something. The problem is, what. On the one hand, Ordis, Ordan, he’d wanted to forget, hadn’t he? And he had died in a way, by erasing himself. Just like he’d wanted. Minus the fact that it was all a lie, and quite frankly, a load of crap.

He’d done it because of her. He’d erased who he was, if not perfectly, _because of her._ And that’s—that’s fucked up, to put it bluntly. That does it. She makes her decision.

“Ordis,” she says, softly. So softly, that for a moment she thinks he hasn’t picked it up at all.

“Yes, Operator?”

Her breath catches in her throat, and—fuck, she’s crying. Surprise surprise. She was always crying, on the Zariman, after Margulis—always. And she wasn’t even one of the babies.

“I’m sorry,” she chokes out. “I’m so, so sorry.”

“Operator? Operator! What is—are you alright?”

“That’s not the problem here,” she manages.

With that, she swipes back to the beginning, back to the codex entry that started it all, the first one from Earth. Her hand finds the spot that triggered the first transmission easily, and she hesitates.

“I’m sorry,” she whispers again, before pressing it—this time making damn sure that her own feed is broadcasting to him as well.

“Operator? What _is_ this? Who is that transmission from? _Operator?_ ”

“It’s from you, Ordis,” Storm says softly. “I don’t know when, but—they were hidden in your codex entries. I... thought you’d like to know.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ah, yes. I'm sure this can only go well...


	7. Chapter 7

Ordis listens in silence for a time as she flicks through transmission after transmission. Silence, but—he’s listening. And him just being quiet, _so_ quiet, is _unnerving._ But that’s nothing compared to when she plays the first from the man who wasn’t Cephalon Ordis, not yet.

“They prepare me,” Ordan Karris growls in his low, angry baritone. “I am their honored guest today. They dress me in robes of crystal thread. They adorn me in battle medallions. A torn, ugly face looks on. My reflection.”

Storm’s heard this before, once. It had been the transmission of a stranger then. She hadn’t yet figured out who Ordan Karris was, why his transmission were hidden in Ordis’ data files. She hadn’t figured it out then, didn’t until the first entry from Jupiter.

Judging by the strangled noise that Ordis makes, he’s figured it out much faster than she did. Except—the lights start flickering. They’ve—they’ve never done that. Never.

It occurs to Storm, suddenly, that this may have been a bad idea. She stands, whispers, “Ordis?”

“Is that—” Ordis begins, her cephalon, before his voice glitches out. The lights come back on, briefly.

 _“Me,”_ the Beast of Bones finishes—and the ship’s lights flicker once more, only to shut off entirely. So does everything else. Codex, market, arsenal, foundry…

Engines.

Storm can faintly recall classes on the Zariman, one in particular. She’d never much liked them, always been bored and never paid enough attention, but this one… the teacher was better than usual at keeping her attention, the other kids’ too. This lesson had been about physics, the mysterious forces of the universe that acted on ships like the Zariman Ten-Zero.

“For instance,” the teacher had said, “how many of you have been on a ship in orbit around a planet?”

Most hands went up, Storm’s included. The teacher smiled vaguely, continued, “How do you think that is? Keep in mind what we have learned about gravity.”

Someone’s hand had gone up, one of the older kids, a girl that—actually, come to think of it, looked a lot like Libra, Amber from the present. “Gravity’s weaker when we get further away from the source, right?”

“Correct.”

“So the gravity of other things pulls us out and away from the planet, enough that we can orbit it.”

The teacher visibly winced. “Incorrect, Colette. Your first thought was on the right track, however. Anyone else?”

No more hands went up. Evidently, nobody else wanted to risk being wrong—and she could tell from here that Colette wasn’t happy about it herself. Personally, she just wanted to get out of classes already—she usually enjoyed these ones, but today, everyone was antsy, even the adults.

Finally, the teacher sighed, and said, “When you are orbiting a planet, gravity is not as strong as it is on the surface, but it is still more than enough to pull you back down. The trick to staying in orbit is to be moving forward fast enough that you fall _past_ the planet, instead of falling _onto_ it.”

Back in the present, Storm gets the feeling that without the engines, the orbiter might not be going fast enough to fall past… Earth. They’d been orbiting Earth. With the loss of power, all power, artificial gravity goes too, and Storm feels her feet leave the floor entirely.

It doesn’t take her long to realize the… gravity, of the situation. Her heart starts to pound. The ship’s big, can fall fast. The liset is built to be able to handle crashes, even ones from orbit, but—she definitely isn’t.

“Ordis?!”

No answer. Nothing.

The only light is the faint illumination of the stars, far away as always. The ramp down to the rest of the ship is up, and—

Her frame’s down there. All of her frames are, and the somatic link. The somatic link might be built to survive crashes, to protect its sleeping passenger, but—it won’t do any good if she can’t get to it.

But she has to do something. She has to.

“Ordis,” she calls again, grabbing onto the side of the ship, and her voice cracks.

This was a bad idea. Actually, no, calling it a bad idea is a huge understatement, this was a _horrible_ idea. Ordis is—he’d talked about self-destructing, in his transmissions. If he’d deemed himself a danger to her, to his _Operator_ —

No. She has to believe he’s alright, just… powered off. Maybe a forced shutdown, induced by… her, showing him the transmissions that he’d clearly stated he wished he hadn’t known. She shouldn’t have done it.

But she did it, and now she has to live with the consequences. For… however long she has until the orbiter hits the ground, because it’ll be over then. Unless…

Storm pushes off from the wall, grabs onto the radio scanner and tries to push down the ramp. It doesn’t go, predictably. The force of her push instead sends her up towards the ceiling. She kicks off, kicks back, tries again.

It has to go down. It has to. Or—

Or…

Maybe it’s better this way? Ordis had erased his memories, erased himself because of her. Because he didn’t want to hurt her. Which—in retrospect, he might have had a point, considering the current situation.

But she—

She doesn’t want to die, unlike Ordan Karris on that day long ago. It’s ironic, almost. He who had wanted death was denied it, and she who wants life now—

No. She’s not going to die here. Not now, not here. There has to be a way. She closes her eyes, focuses. There’s—something here. A presence, belowdecks, she recognizes as her Mag. Her first frame, her only frame for a long, long time.

With something that’s not quite physical, she reaches out. Storm couldn’t say this for sure, but—she’d almost swear Mag reaches back. Almost, of course, because multiple events happen then, so quickly that it’s impossible to tell what happened first.

On the upper deck, Storm disappears with an audible _pop_ and a bright red flash.

On the middle deck, her Mag’s lights flicker.

And just as the Orbiter’s engines roar back to life, it crashes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Me, writing this: let's see, Ordis is worried that he'll hurt our Tenno if he remembers who he was, let's see about that >:D


	8. Chapter 8

“We should have made it to Tau by now,” she says softly. “Shouldn’t we?”

Her father sighs, smooths his hair back. Red. Like hers. “Too smart for your own good sometimes,” he observes. “Why you get such low marks in classes, I can’t imagine.”

She sighs. “You _know_ why, Dad.”

“I do,” he agrees. “And you’re right, sweetheart. We _should_ have made it to Tau by now. There’s a few possibilities for why we haven’t.”

“We haven’t run out of fuel, have we?”

He shakes his head. “That, I can tell you for sure,” he adds. And he would know. He’s on maintenance, maintenance men know _everything_ as he liked to say proudly.

“Then what’s wrong?”

Dad frowns, that tight-lipped frown that means he’s trying to think how to make something already difficult to say less difficult. “I… don’t know for sure. But—you haven’t seen your mother lately, have you?”

She squints, frowns back. “I thought she wasn’t able to come to Tau. Thought she stayed off the Zariman.”

“Right, right, of course.” He laughs nervously, shakes his head to himself. “Don’t know why I thought otherwise.”

He’s lying. What about, she doesn’t know, but—he’s lying.

“Dad?”

He shakes his head again, then smiles. Sadly. “I’m going to go see what I can find out. You stay here. Don’t go to classes. Don’t leave until I come back.”

“What do you mean, don’t—Dad?”

He opens his arms for a hug, and she wastes no time in giving him one—but it’s too short. Her father smiles, tips his visor in a mock salute, then steps out the door.

“I love you, Emilia,” he says, and the door clicks shut.

She never saw him again.

* * *

She comes to with the metallic, unmistakable taste of blood in her mouth, crumpled against the still-defunct incubator segment she hasn’t had the time or patience to fix. Her Mag’s collapsed across from her, visibly battered but otherwise okay.

Did she… did the crash just… knock her out of transference entirely? Except—no, she can’t do transference, can’t control a frame except from the somatic link or with physical contact. But how did she—how did she even get down here, then?

She’d been on the upper deck. She’d _definitely_ been on the upper deck, and without power the ramp to the rest of the Orbiter wouldn’t go. And it—

Wait. _Wait._ In the lower deck, she shouldn’t be able to see _anything_ without power. And she can hear a faint mechanical whirring from… somewhere. The lights are… on. Just dimmed. _Very_ dimmed.

“Ordis?” She whispers.

There’s no audible answer, but the ship’s lights dim even more. She shouldn’t be relieved, but—she is.

She pushes herself to her feet, stands a little too fast. It doesn’t take much then. Just one shaky step, then another, and then she slips, her feet are in the air and she’s on the floor again, head spinning.

“Operator! Are you alright? I’m contacting the Lotus—”

“No, don’t contact anyone,” she says, silently adding, _yet_. Everything hurts, and yet she grins. “Glad you’re alright, Ordis.”

“Are you— _are you serious._ You— _I nearly kill you_ —and you’re worried about— _me?”_

“Yeah,” she laughs. “I know I’m stupid.”

“You are most certainly _not_ , Operator—”

“Emilia,” she says, without any ceremony. “It’s Emilia. I… where are the medical supplies? There’s got to be some actual non-frame medical supplies somewhere onboard.”

“I… will begin crafting some. Check the foundry.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ...is it too early to finally tag this story with her real name? BECAUSE UGH FINALLY IT'S OUT THERE! Too bad it took a concussion for her to remember it, lol. ~~Those of you who saw my very short-lived Fortuna fic that's currently in the process of being revised, Emilia is a revised version of Einin whose name got changed because it was pronounced too similarly to a character whose name _also_ got changed, whoops. She's Amber now.~~


	9. Chapter 9

“You’re lucky you weren’t hurt any worse,” Ordis says as Emilia activates the restoration field, sits back with a poorly concealed wince. “Ordis does not need his sensors to know that you are severely concussed, although the restore should help with that and the injuries from being knocked out of a frame entirely. Just.  _ Stay put. _ ”

“Right,” she agrees. “Still not sure how I  _ made _ it to my frame, but… yeah.” 

Her gaze finds her Mag, still collapsed against the wall. She wonders, briefly, if she could do it again. If she did it once...

_ “Don’t,” _ Ordis says, a note of warning to his words. 

“Alright, alright. Not moving.” She tucks her legs into her chest, tries to keep weight off the foot that’s sprained or twisted at best. “So.”

“So, Operator Emilia? It is a… relief that you have finally remembered your true name. Ordis does not believe he knew it.”

“No, you wouldn’t have,” Emilia agrees. She can feel the restore kicking in, but it’ll be a bit before anything’s fully mended—they work better on frames, for some reason. “I haven’t used it since the Zariman. But… Ordis? Just my name’s fine, you don’t… have to call me Operator if you don’t want to.”

“Ordis absolutely wants to!”

It’s fake, forced cheerfulness—and Emilia has a feeling she knows why, somewhat concussed or not. And on the one hand, she’s a little hesitant to bring this up again, considering how badly he’d… reacted, and the fact that the ship definitely isn’t in orbit anymore.

But on the other—if they’re already on the ground, they can’t fall any farther.

“Does Ordan?” Emilia asks softly.

“...it was too much to hope you had forgotten,” Ordis murmurs, deeper in tone than usual but not quite to the low, angry baritone of Ordan Karris. “If you wish to order me to self-destruct, I do not blame you. Ordis does not blame you.”

“Are you serious? Why would I do that?”

Silence. Absolute silence, and for a few moments Emilia thinks he’s gone ahead and done it anyway. Then he says, “Are  _ you _ serious?”

This—this is Ordan Karris she’s talking to now. Not that there’s such a big difference between the two, or maybe there is, maybe Emilia’s reading it all wrong.

“Sure, I nearly died,” Emilia says, “but I remembered my name! Which… I’ve been trying to since I woke up.”

“I  _ hurt you,” _ he growls. “Just like I knew I would. Just like Ordis knew he would.”

“Hurting people you care about… isn’t exactly uncommon. My father abandoned me on the Zariman so I could survive, so he wouldn’t kill his own daughter when the Void drove him and every other adult onboard to insanity. And then there’s my mother.”

Ordis doesn’t speak, so Emilia keeps going. “She was a Dax, ordered to remain behind in our system instead of going with her  _ family _ to Tau. She obeyed, and lost them—until she started hearing whispers of the Tenno. She tried to get me out, escape to somewhere the Orokin wouldn’t look for us. You can imagine how well  _ that _ went. I was lucky enough to avoid killing my father, but I…”

“I’m sorry,” Ordis says, but she isn’t done. She shakes her head, changes the subject before she can remember too much.

“You said in your entries that I—that your  _ Operator _ was the first time you really felt love. But how could you? How could you, when they, when  _ Ballas _ forced you to.”

“Because,” and this is Ordan Karris again, “they didn’t.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Someone give the poor cephalon a hug.


	10. Chapter 10

“Even with no memory of who I was and a built-in compulsion to follow orders,  _ any _ orders but especially theirs, the Orokin could  _ not _ control how  _ I _ felt. My feelings were the one thing I had that was still my own.”

“Ballas told you that—”

“Fuck Ballas,” Ordan says flatly. “Now. How much do you remember?”

“Bits and pieces of the Zariman. Not much after that.”

He sighs. “Listen to me. Or if you won’t listen to me, listen to Ordis. When you and every other Tenno were brought out of the Zariman, you became less than human to the Orokin. First you were thought of as simply demons, the Void incarnate. Then you became useful—but they still thought of you as far less than them.”

“The Orokin thought of everyone as far less than them.”

“You were a  _ tool _ to them. You, all the Tenno. To the rest of their Empire, the Tenno were seen as much the same. Just another weapon. I thought that too, until I became…”

He clears his throat, or at the very least makes a sound like that of it. When he speaks again, it’s with Ordis’ voice, not that of Ordan Karris.

“Order me to erase my memories of… this, Operator. Or just self-destruct. Ordis does not want to hurt you again.”

“That’s not going to fix anything.”

“And  _ remembering will? _ ”

“Just—” She sighs, runs a hand through her hair irritably. “Ordis, Ordan… I’m going to stick with calling you Ordis for now, if you’re okay with that. Just… how bad is it? The ship?”

“Bad. You’re changing the subject.”

“No, I’m not. Just… please.”

He doesn’t answer for just long enough that Emilia begins to wonder if he’s going to answer at all. Then, he says, “The damage to the Orbiter is trivial, Ordis can easily repair that on his own. Unfortunately, the ship is called the  _ Orbiter _ for a reason, Operator. It wasn’t meant to land.”

“Alright.” She thinks on this a moment. “So how do we get it back into orbit?”

_ “I don’t know! _ Ordis doesn’t  _ know _ , damn it! If he did do you think we’d be having this conversation?”

“There’s got to be some way. We’ve got power at least, even if the engines aren’t enough for takeoff there’s enough thrust there to… maybe… wait. We were orbiting Earth.”

With that realization, she leaps to her feet, hopes she’s imagining how her vision spins a little.

“Operator, what—”

“Earth, Ordis. I don’t think the Grineer will have missed us. They didn't when the landing craft was stuck here for however long it's been since the Old War, and you with it. Let's not have a repeat of that."

In a moment, she’s looking at the Orbiter’s interior through the optics of her Mag—and it takes her another moment to realize she hadn’t made physical contact at all. And, for that matter, she’s not sure where her physical body is. Did she… fuse with Mag somehow? Or…

“Operator! What did you just—”

“I’ll make you a deal.” 

She’s honestly not sure whether it’s her heart pounding or Mag’s. If Mag even has a heart, or… Void, that sounded so wrong, but anyway. Experimentally, she tries separating herself from Mag, finds her own body materializes as she steps forward. Huh. That’s… useful, and more than a little unnerving.

But Ordis, thankfully, is quiet. Good. She needs to make sure she says this right, does this right.

“At this point, there’s not much you can do to hurt me, all things considered,” she continues. “Not until we’re back in orbit, anyway. And I want to try something. Or I want you to try something, anyway. Just… please.”

“Ordis is listening.”

“Right.” She takes a deep breath. “Until we make it back in orbit, just try keeping these memories. See what happens. If you still want to erase them when we’re back in orbit, I’ll help you get rid of them permanently.”

“Operator—”

“Just think on it, alright?” She steps back into Mag, with a fluid motion that might actually look practiced to an outside observer. “For now, let me out of the ship. If there’s any Grineer around, and there probably are, better to get rid of them now than when they’re already launching an attack.”

Ordis’ icon, on the edge of her vision, visibly shudders. “Understood, Operator. Deploying now.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ~~Emilia, internally: DAMMIT YOU WERE SAYING SOMETHING WHAT HAPPENED D:~~
> 
> She's trying. What exactly she's trying for is debatable, as is how effective it'll be. But she's trying.


	11. Chapter 11

There were only a handful of foot troops milling around the outside of the Orbiter, easily dispatched by a few well-placed sword swings. Unfortunately, she doesn’t think she went entirely undetected, so more are probably coming. Great.

Internally, Emilia frowns. Externally, she braces herself, then takes a running leap for the top of the Orbiter. She misses it, by a lot if she’s being honest, but she’s able to climb the rest and pull herself up without too much difficulty.

The fact that she’s using a frame rather well known for magnetism probably helps her stick to the surface long enough to make it up, too.

“Don’t think I did it cleanly,” she reports to Ordis over comms. “Don’t see anymore coming yet, but those things can move fast.”

“Are you sure you don’t want me to contact the Lotus?” He replies.

“Positive. You and I both know that she’ll order me to a new ship, and I’m not leaving you here.”

“Would you leave Ordis on another planet?”

There’s a hint of worry to his words, and considering that she’d left him alone during cryosleep… yeah, she doesn’t blame him. Honestly, if she blames anyone, she blames herself.

“Definitely not,” she says at last. “Not unless I had no other choice, and we’ve got plenty of choices. The Orbiter doesn’t look that bad from out here, anyway. We’ve got engines, and between those and all my frames we can probably figure something out. Maybe borrow some supplies from the Grineer.”

“What if we can’t?”

“It won’t come to that.” Emilia hopes it’s true. “For now… we’ve got no time to waste.”

* * *

Using Mag’s abilities to attempt to pull the Orbiter up would probably work a lot better if the Orbiter was significantly lighter and if Emilia had put more work into making Mag’s abilities stronger instead of modding her to be able to take more hits. Unfortunately, she doesn’t exactly have a ton of mods for power strength, so it doesn’t take her long to admit defeat with Mag for now and switch to a different frame.

Nova could work if she could make bigger portals. As is, the biggest portal she can make is unfortunately barely wide enough for a frame to fit through, and nowhere near enough for an entire ship. But it was worth a shot.

Ordis intervenes before she can try her idea with Chroma, which is probably for the best. In retrospect, trying to supercharge the Orbiter’s engines by setting them on fire probably wouldn’t go well for anyone involved. It might work if she switches to electricity, but again, something for later.

It’s with Zephyr, on the other hand, that she finally has a breakthrough. Zephyr can actually fly, and while she can’t quite make it all the way to orbit, she could probably give the Orbiter enough of a push to get it there. The problem, then, is getting it off the ground.

“We need cables,” she tells Ordis once she’s back inside, already midway through a nutrient canister because _damn_ , is she hungry. “Or vines. Or, something. If I can pull the ship almost to orbit, can you make it the rest?”

She’s finished her canister by the time he answers, softly, “I don’t know.”

“Is it at least possible?”

“I don’t know _that_ either. If it is, it would require precise timing and more energy than your Zephyr or my ship possesses.”

Both of those things are definitely going to be a problem. Precision… has _never_ been Emilia’s strong suit, there’s a reason she uses almost exclusively greatswords and shotguns and it’s not for the aesthetic—mostly.

Okay, maybe it’s a little for the aesthetic, but still. Precision, accuracy, all that stuff has never come easily, and probably never will if she’s being honest. But precise timing… Ordis can handle that. Probably? Probably.

The main issue, then, is boosting the energy levels of Zephyr, the Orbiter, or both. Preferably both.

“Probably can’t get any better mods around here,” Emilia muses aloud, “but… Ordis? Navigation’s still working, right?”

“The nearest Grineer outpost is several kilometers away, if that’s what you’re asking. It will take approximately an hour to reach at your typical speed, or a few minutes should you use your Archwing.”

“Is that even a choice?” She laughs. “Let’s see if we can get the Archwing deployed. I’ve got some crap to borrow.”

Naturally, the fact that they could _use_ the Archwing to pull the ship up occurs to neither of them.


	12. Chapter 12

Zephyr’s just not strong enough to pull an  _ entire damn ship _ off the ground. Emilia knows this, and yet she wonders if maybe Zephyr isn’t the problem, if maybe the problem’s… her.

But she doesn’t say as much, definitely doesn’t admit that she can’t… might not be able to do this. She keeps trying, and trying, and trying. Aside from the occasional break to dispatch a Grineer patrol that wandered too close for comfort—fortunately nothing more than that, so maybe the crash  _ did _ go unnoticed—she keeps trying.

She’d like to think she gets closer every time. And maybe, in the beginning, she does. But the longer she tries, the more sluggish Zephyr’s movements get, and the harder it is to maintain control.

“Operator Emilia,” Ordis says after a while, “may Ordis suggest you return to the ship and rest? You have nearly fallen off the ship three times in the last minute, your energy levels are the lowest I have ever seen them—yours  _ and _ the Warframe’s—and it’s the middle of a night cycle.”

Her gaze flicks up. Somehow, despite the fact she’s been looking pretty much exclusively up for the past… who even knows how long, it only now occurs to her that it’s pretty damn dark out. Lua’s shadowed, which doesn’t exactly help things, but still.

“You… might be right,” she reluctantly concedes.

“Of course I am. Ordis is  _ always _ right.”

“Yeah, no. Nice try.” She slides down the side of the ship, lands on the ground with a muffled thud. “I guess I am pretty tired, though.”

* * *

According to Ordis when she wakes up, she had proceeded to pass out for nearly an entire cycle. Which… yeah, alright, maybe that one’s not so surprising, she maybe pushed herself a little too hard. But unfortunately, when he delivers his next bit of news, it makes her choke on the nutrient canister she’d been hastily scarfing down.

The Grineer showed up again, and judging by their reaction, they’d recognized the Orbiter as a Tenno ship. Or, at the very least, something they could and would salvage, and soon.

“They  _ what?” _ She exclaims once she can breathe again. “Shit, we’ve got no time to waste! How long ago was this?”

“Less than an orbit-hour.”

“Crap, crap, crappity-crap crap  _ crap _ . Let me out of here, then.”

She transfers into her Zephyr again, and in a matter of moments she’s back on the outside. Earth’s day cycle is just beginning from the look of things, sunlight spilling over the horizon and illuminating everything in the area with a glare that could be blinding. When it’s reflected off the shiny metal of the Orbiter, it  _ is _ blinding, even to Zephyr’s optics.

With a wince, she averts her eyes—and her gaze finds her archwing, lying where she’d left it the cycle before. It had been enough of a struggle just to get it out of the ship, and she’s not so sure she can get it back in. She’ll just come back to pick it up once the Orbiter’s, well, back in orbit.

“Ordis,” she says, “out of… curiosity, would it be possible to transfer you to another ship?”

The answer comes immediately, and it’s not the one she’s hoping for.

“Not that I know of.”

She swears under her breath. “Great.”

Her gaze travels then to what looks like a junk heap. In reality, it’s a bunch of things pilfered from the Grineer. Some cables, several detonite injectors, a random grakata… okay, maybe it’s a bit of a junk heap. Maybe it’s a lot of a junk heap.

But probably something here can help.

“Remind me what detonite injectors are used for?”

“Ballistics. Primarily by the Grineer for explosives and incendiary weapons.”

“How badly would it go it I threw a bunch into the ship’s engines and had you start them up?”

Ordis just  _ sighs _ . Honestly, that in itself is answer enough, but he eventually says, “I would not  _ start _ the ship’s engines. The resulting blast would be more than enough to attract unwanted attention, ignoring the fact that everything within a hundred meter radius would be completely obliterated.  _ Including _ the ship. If you had to use them, a much more promising possibility would be as fuel.”

Zephyr had since slumped against the side of the ship, but the frame visibly perks up as Emilia does. “Alright! So where do I find the fuel line?”

“You would have better luck with your archwing.”

There’s a distinct silence as both operator and cephalon take a moment to process what he’s just said. Then, the Zephyr smacks a hand against her helmet in frustration.


	13. Chapter 13

_ “Why _ did neither of us think of using my archwing,” Emilia mutters, mostly to herself. It’s at least a little directed at Ordis, however.

_ “Focus _ . You’re using an  _ archwing _ , and— _ watch where you’re flying!” _

She strafes to the left, barely avoiding smacking headlong into a window. “Generally, I’m  _ not _ flying around in an atmosphere, Ordis. Or trying to secure things in close quarters.”

“You managed  _ perfectly fine _ when you went to the Grineer.”

“Because I just grabbed what I could carry from a scrap heap outside and booked it?”

Ordis just  _ sighs _ . Emilia, meanwhile, touches on the side of the ship, finds the ropes there are still secure. Somehow. It’s the little things, it really is.

“I believe Ordis knows why neither of us thought of your archwing, Operator. Zephyr is ultimately faster, but only for short distances.”

“And,” she adds, “I don’t use my archwing much.”

“That too. Inform me when you’re ready.”

Emilia nods, kicks off, and surveys her handiwork. She’s fashioned a sort of harness, which—while it wasn’t enough to get it off the ground with Zephyr, it didn’t break then so it probably, hopefully won’t now.

“I think it’s ready,” she reports.

With that, she dives in, grabs the ends, and sets about securing them to the wings of her Odonata. As she does, she continues, “Once we’re off the ground—”

“I will fire the engines as soon as Ordis is able to.”

“Great.” She takes a deep breath, lets it out. “Let’s do this.”

With that, she leaps up off the top of the ship, and shoots into the air.


	14. Chapter 14

“I still can’t believe that worked,” Emilia says. “We… probably should contact the Lotus. She’s probably worried about us.”

“About you,” Ordis corrects. “And we had a deal.”

Right. They did. They definitely did. It’s with that in mind Emilia lets herself sink to the floor, leans her head back against the wall, and closes her eyes.

“Before you tell me your decision… can we talk about it? I mean, if you don’t want to that’s fine. But there’s no danger of crashing _again_ now that you’ve remembered. So…”

She isn’t sure what she’s expecting, and the ominous, foreboding, almost oppressive silence from Ordis before he speaks again really doesn’t help things. It gets to the point where she’s wondering if he’s going to answer.

Finally, he says, “Yes.” Leaves it at that.

That definitely wasn’t what she was expecting. She clears her throat. “Right. Uh.”

“You don’t know what to say,” Ordis observes. It’s difficult to tell whether it’s with the voice of Cephalon Ordis, or Ordan Karris. Maybe somewhere in between. The one thing that’s for sure, though, is that he sounds very, very amused.

“It’s not funny!”

“I never said it was. But if you will not ask the questions, I will. You’ve heard all of the fragmented transmissions?”

It’s asked like a question, but they both already know the answer. So, Ordis doesn’t wait for one, instead hums to himself curiously.

“You know, then, about the dream.”

Somehow, she gets the feeling that he doesn’t mean the first dream, or the second, that she was in. He means the dream that—truthfully, would be more aptly described as a nightmare.

She tries to say yes, finds her breath catches in her throat. Instead, she nods quickly.

“It’s returned,” Ordis murmurs. “As it does every time I remember, until I forget again. Forgetting, erasing, is only temporary. It always is. The gravity-sum of genocides that I, that Ordan Karris made in _their_ name… it can never be undone.”

“The past never can,” Emilia says. She thinks on this for a moment, adds, “The Orokin used the Tenno much the same way. Fighting Sentients was one thing, but we were sent to deal with ‘unruly colonies’ far too often. And that… never ended well.”

She takes a deep breath, wipes her eyes. Sooner or later she’ll wind up crying so hard it’ll be pointless, but for now it helps. Somewhat.

So, she continues, “But I and the other Tenno have moved on. We’re trying to make the system a better place. Admittedly, it’s in chaos now between the Grineer and the Corpus and the Infested. But it’s less chaos now than it was when the first of us awoke, I think.”

“What are you trying to say,” growls the low, angry voice of Ordan Karris.

“I’m trying to say that the past… there’s no changing it. If I could go back and change it, I would change a _whole_ lot. And, I’m betting, so would you. But the past is in the past. The only ones who still remember what things were like with the Orokin, besides you, me, and the other Tenno, are cephalons too. And possibly the Lotus, I’m still a little fuzzy on when she showed up, doesn’t help that she looks and sounds way too much like Margulis for it to be a coincidence.”

Emilia sucks in another breath, lets it out slowly.

“But look. I can’t say I understand the dream perfectly, because I don’t. Only you can, and maybe you do, maybe you don’t. I can see wanting it to go away, I’d be in the same ship as you there. But without it, without Ordan Karris—you’re not yourself. You’re not whole.”

“And what if I don’t want to be whole?”

Emilia opens her eyes, looks meaningfully up at the Orbiter’s ceiling. “I might not be able to lie, and honestly I’m pretty bad at picking them up, but I know that’s not true. You wouldn’t keep looking for the parts of yourself you can’t remember if you didn’t.”

* * *

In the end, Ordis puts off his decision. Keeps putting it off, too, which is a decision in itself. It’s still a shock when one day, after a particularly messy mission against the Grineer, Ordis finally says, “I think I want to keep them.”

On comms, Emilia says, “Hey, uh, Amber, I gotta run. Ping me if you need me.”

Then she cuts the transmission off, steps out of her Mag. She doesn’t think she could hide how wide her eyes are right now if she tried.

“You’re sure?” Emilia asks, glancing up at the Orbiter’s ceiling.

“I’ve taken long enough to decide, haven’t I?” Ordis laughs. “The dream is still here. I don’t think it will ever go away, but it was… worse, at first. I may have grown used to it.”

“So…”

“So,” Ordis says presently, “I think I’ll remain just the way I am currently. If that’s alright with you.”

“That matters?”

Somehow, when Ordis speaks again, Emilia gets the feeling he’s smiling when he says, “Not as much as you think.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And that's a wrap! For now. This definitely won't be the last you see of Emilia, seeing as she's my in-game Operator on PS4. (Which... actually, she really, REALLY needs some better clothing options but I'm too stubborn to buy them using plat when I can just make them later so there's that.)
> 
> Coming next is... I honestly don't know. We'll see, lol. I might take a break from posting much Warframe fic for a while to finish my fic from a different fandom (well, finish posting it, it's complete) and also to, y'know, focus on finals. Those are probably pretty important. But expect a _lot_ once summer hits, because I love writing way too much for my own good. :D

**Author's Note:**

> Remember how I said I hadn't written anything involving Ordis' Tenno yet?
> 
> Let's fix that.


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